All that lies Beneath
by GrapeForLife
Summary: An AUcrossover fic that takes place before Season 3. John Stoppable receives a telegram from someone with the initials MP. What does that have to do with Kim and Ron?
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own Kim Possible nor do I own the Necronomicon. I wish I do though since it'll mean that I never have to work at all.

Author's Note: My first Kim Possible fic and my first time posting here. Read and enjoy, ppl. Reviews aren't necessary but they are welcome and so are flames.

* * *

The Old Ones were, the Old Ones are and the Old Ones shall be. From the dark stars They came ere man was born, unseen and loathsome They descended to primal earth.

Abdul Al-hazred, Necronomicon

* * *

_Middleton, 1905_

_Nearly a year had passed since the Middleton World Fair, and still he had not given up on finding the one evidence that would prove her innocence once and for all. He knew deep within his heart that she had not done as Inspector Barkin had insisted to everyone._

_But he just couldn't find it._

_It was depressing, that he couldn't help the one person who had helped him so many times in the past. Now when she needed his help the most, he couldn't even do it right…_

"_Telegram for John Stoppable!"_

_John looked up from his writing desk, startled out of his drunken sleep. His head throbbed painfully, as if there were twenty large men pounding on his skull. Maybe he shouldn't have drunk that last glass of scotch…_

"_Okay, Mim…I'm getting up," he mumbled and knocked aside some of his papers, revealing a black and white photograph of him and a young woman who had her hair up in a bun._

_The knocking on his door continued and a voice called out, "Telegram for John Stoppable!"_

_Finally John stirred out of his seat and shuffled his way to his front door. After several more minutes of listening to the incessant pounding, he reached the door and he opened it._

_Before him stood a young man, a year or so younger than he was, dressed in a delivery boy's uniform. He held an envelope in his hand which he waved about rather impatiently._

"_Are you John Stoppable?" he asked._

_John nodded his head and said, "You said you had a telegram for me?"_

"_Here you go," the other man said and handed him the envelope. John took the envelope away from him and slammed the door in his face._

"_Asshole!"_

_John ignored him as he ripped the envelope open and took out the telegram inside._

Meet me at the Lost Soul bar at 7 o' clock in the evening tonight. Come alone.MP

_MP…could it really be her? After so long? John rushed to his washroom to prepare himself. If it really was her, he wanted to be prepared._

_

* * *

_

Goldenton, 2004

"Alright, boys! Let her rip!"

A loud explosion erupted through the air, leaving behind a small cloud of dust and a hole where a mine's barricade once stood. A cool wind blew through the area, dispersing the cloud and revealing the mine's entrance to the whole world once more.

"Hey boss, are you sure there's still gold in this mine?" an Italian man of average build asked nervously. There was something about this mine that scared the pants out of him and he didn't like it one bit.

His 'boss', a heavy-set man with long brown hair which he tied in a pony-tail, nodded excitedly as he lifted up a worn-looking journal to the other man's eyes. "Of course I'm sure. This is my great-grandfather's journal we're talking about here and according to this here book, this mine was closed because of some kind of toxic gas build-up which forced everyone to run away before the gold could be mined," he said with the familiar glint of greed.

"Toxic gas? Do you think that it might still be in there?" another man, a young African-American asked cautiously as he stopped inspecting his gear and looked up to stare at the other two men.

"Relax! The gas would have probably dissipated by now! I mean, it's been a hundred years since they closed the mine up. What makes you think the gas might still be there?"

"Well…first there's the powerful sense of foreboding that I'm getting and not to mention the fact that every time in the movies when people blow up a sealed mine with the sole purpose of looting it, they usually die a horrible and painful death," the Italian man pointed out.

"Will you cut that out, Dave? We are not movie characters and we will be just fine. Not to mention rich," the brown-haired man said in an attempt to persuade his two friends.

"Well…I hope you're right, John," the third man said. "I know I'd hate to be in there if the whole toxic gas stuff were still floating around in," he continued with a slight shudder as he turned his gaze towards the mine's entrance.

"No pain, no gain, Hal," John said with a big grin on his face as he hefted up his bulky backpack onto his shoulders with one hand and turned on the heavy duty torchlight in his other hand. Then he walked forward into the mine for about several feet before turning around and saying, "Well…are you two coming or not?"

Hal and Dave looked at each other for a second or two before Dave said, "Fine but don't say I didn't warn you!"

With that, the two of them walked after John as they began their journey into the abandoned mine.

* * *

_John sat down at the bar, waiting impatiently while he nursed a half-empty glass of scotch in his hand and glanced at his pocket watch. He had came to the bar ten minutes early, hoping that he might be able to catch his mystery messenger unaware but now according to his watch, it was now half past seven. If it really was Mim, she wouldn't have been late…_

_A red-haired man wearing a ten gallon hat and a leather duster sat down next to him. "Give me a shot of whiskey," he said, his voice sounding like as though he just had a terrible cough. The shot he ordered was given to him quickly enough and he left two dollars on the table._

_John watched this with a disinterested eye. Whoever this MP was, it definitely wasn't Mim so why the hell was he here? He should be out there, looking for that electro-static thing which would help save her, not waste his time here in the bar…_

Yes, just like every other night, which you don't spend in some other bar drinking yourself to death,_ a harsh voice sounded in his mind. _Stupid conscience,_ he thought irritably. Maybe he should just…_

"_Hey."_

_John turned to look at the stranger sitting next to him. "What?" he snapped irritably. _

"_I have a message for you," the other man said._

"_Oh…how do you know that it's for me?"_

"_You're John Stoppable, right?"_

_John nodded his head cautiously, uncertain as to what this man was hinting about._

"_Come outside with me. We need to talk alone."_

"_Who are you? What's all this about?"_

_The red-haired man leaned forward and whispered, "I've have a message for you from Mim Possible."_

_John stared at the man in surprise. "What did you just say?" he asked in shock._

"_Not here. Meet me behind the bar in five minutes. I'll leave first and wait for you there," he said as he got up and left the bar, his shot of whiskey still untouched._

"_Dear God…" John whispered and gulped down his drink. _Maybe I need another drink_, he thought and motioned at the bartender to refill his glass._

_Five minutes later, John left two five dollar bills on the bar and walked out of the bar. It was a cool, autumn's night and there were a few people walking the streets. Most of Middleton's inhabitants had left for the new mining town of Goldenton, where several fortunate men had recently discovered gold. If it wasn't for his quest to prove Mim's innocence, he would have probably joined them as well._

_Looking around to make sure that nobody could see him, John walked as stealthily as he could to the back lane where the red-haired man had arranged to meet him. The moment he entered the alley, he saw his mystery man, pacing about the lane in a slightly flustered manner. At the sound of John's footsteps, he lifted his head up and grinned at him._

"_Okay…so talk," John said, as he approached the stranger slowly. There was something familiar about this guy but he couldn't quite place his finger on it. "You said you had a message from Mim. What is it?"_

"_This." The stranger marched right up to John and planted a powerful kiss on his lips._

_

* * *

_

It had been five hours since John, Hal and Dave had entered the mine and they were still alive. That was good because it meant that the toxic gas had already dissipated. It was also bad because that meant that they hadn't found any gold yet.

"Are you sure there's gold in this mine?" Dave complained as he picked himself up from the floor after he had tripped over a loose rock for the fifth time.

"I'm positive," John said but the confidence he felt earlier could not be heard in his voice. _Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all, _a voice nagged at the back of his mind. All he had to do was turn back and then everything would be just …

"Hey! What's this?" Hal said with a frown on his face. He had been sweeping his torch around to make a sweep of the tunnel they were walking in when he noticed something glinting on the wall. He walked up to the spot where he saw the glint and he saw what seems to be a small, round disc embedded in the wall.

"Did you find something?" John asked excitedly as he and Dave went over to Hal's side.

"Yeah…hold on a second," Hal said as he pulled a crowbar out from his backpack and began to pry the disc out of the wall. After a minute or so, he managed to loosen the disc enough for him to remove it by hand. John moved his torch over Hal's hand so that they could take a closer look at the disc.

The disc seemed to be made of steel and had a five-pointed star acid-etched onto its face. There also seemed to be a lot of scouring along its face as well, as if something has been flaying at it.

"How the hell did that get stuck in there?" Dave wondered aloud as he touched the rocky surface of the wall. It seemed impossible to him that the disc could have been hammered into the wall and remained embedded there for the next century or so…

"Who cares? It's just a piece of junk," John said disgusted and snatched the disc away from Hal. Before the latter could complain, he had already flung the disc further into the tunnel. Wherever it landed, it made two loud metallic clinks…followed by the soft sound of metal hitting flesh.

"Er…did you guys hear that?" Dave asked, fear slowly creeping into his voice.

"Yeah…what do you think it was?" Hal asked.

John frowned. There was a part in his great-grandfather's story that read like the ravings of a lunatic, something about meeting a 'thing' inside the mines while he was still working here but he had dismissed as the words of someone who had been affected by gas, which was obvious when he read about the mine's closure due to some sort of leakage…

"Maybe, we ought to check it out," he said, doing his best to muster as much nonchalance into his voice as he could.

"Hell yeah we gonna check it out," Dave snorted indignantly. "I say we get our asses out of this place before whatever it is that was in there decides to come over here to check us out," he continued.

John turned to look at Hal. "Looks like you're the deciding factor, man. Choose wisely," he said with a grin.

"I dunno…Dave's got a point…"

"Yeah, but think of all the gold that we might find, or if not think of how much we could earn if we catch that thing in there," John said with his all too familiar glint of greed in his eye.

"Money's a good motivator," Hal said with a slight grin. "…but in this case, I have to go with Dave. I don't want to think of what could survive that gas leakage and still be alive after a hundred years."

"You're both a bunch of cowards, you know that!" John snapped.

"Better a living coward than a dead hero," Dave countered as he turned around and began to walk back toward the entrance.

"Fine! But if I find anything down here, you guys ain't getting any of it!" John said before he turned and walk off in the opposite direction.

Hal sighed once as he watched John walk off into the darkness, his eyes fixed on the fading figure of his friend until he could no longer see him. Then he turned around and started to trot after Dave.

* * *

"_Excuse me!" John spluttered in indignation as he pushed the man back and away from him. "Look, I think you're a great guy and all that but we hardly know each other and I'm not interested in men. Although you are quite good looking…" he continued to ramble on._

_The man removed his hat and said, "John, stop babbling," causing him to stop in mid-ramble and to stare at him, or more appropriately, her. The long, red hair, the emerald green eyes, the same devil-may-care smile…_

"_Mim…is that really you?" he asked._

"_The one and only," she said with a grin, her voice back to her normal one. _God, she's changed a lot in the past year_, John thought sadly as he noted the bags under her eyes, wrinkles where there was once smooth skin…_

_She stepped forward and enveloped him in a crushing hug. All this kissing and hugging was new too, but this was one bit which John could grow use to very quickly._

"_I missed you," she whispered under her breath._

"_So did I… but what was that kiss all about? Not that I didn't like it but…did I just say that? I mean, er…"_

"_John, be calm. It was just a prank. But I'm glad you enjoyed it though," she said with a slight smirk on her lips._

"_Er…right…so why did you come back here? Did you find something that might prove your innocence? Or are you here to turn yourself in? Mim, if you're going to do that, I swear that I'll…" John started to say when Mim began to shake her head._

"_John, I'm not going to turn myself in.," she said and patted him on his arm._

"_Then does that mean…" John said with a glimmer of hope on his face._

_She shook her head. "An acquaintance of ours sent a message to me two weeks ago and he said he needs my help to retrieve something," she informed him._

"_Mim, you're still playing the adventurer role?" John asked incredulously. Her life was in ruins because of it and she stills carries on with it…_

_She gave him a slight shrug. "It helps to pay for food and travel money. And I believe it's in my blood," she said._

_John shook his head. "Same old Mim…what do you need?" he asked._

"_A place to lay low while I meet our acquaintance. It should only be a few days at most," she said._

"_Is that all?"_

"_Yes."_

_John sighed in response to her answer. "And here I was thinking that you came back to visit your friends and your family who have been worried sick about your disappearance," he said with mock sadness._

_Mim smiled at his words and she reached out to touch his cheek. "Well…there is that too," she said softly._

_John took her hand in his and said, "Welcome back, Mim Possible. It's good to see you again."_

_

* * *

_

"Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to leave him down here, was it?" Hal asked Dave as they sat down on the ground outside the mine. It had taken them two hours to reach the entrance and they had been resting there for the past hour or so, waiting for John to emerge from the mine.

Dave nodded his head in agreement, his face the very picture of worry. All the horror movies that he had watched were racing through his mind. At this moment, he was certain that something had happened to John and that his limbs had been ripped from his body or that he was being tortured by unimaginable creatures or maybe…

A loud cry of jubilation could be heard echoing through the mine's tunnel and the two of them looked at each other in confusion.

"Okay, this isn't what that's suppose to happen," Dave said as he and Hal got up to their feet. They could see a tiny dot of light moving towards them from the depths of the mine.

"John? Is that you?" Hal called out.

"Oh yeah! Who's your daddy now?" John shouted as he walked out, his face covered with dust and his backpack bulging.

"You found the gold?" Dave asked excitedly.

"Yup! And you're not getting a single piece of the booty," John announced in an I-told-you-so tone and held on tightly to the straps of his backpack.

"Aw…c'mon man! We were only jus' kiddin'! Right Hal?" Dave turned towards his other friend for support.

Hal, on the other hand, had other concerns on his mind. "John, what about that other sound we heard down there in the mine? Did you find out what it was?" he asked.

John nodded. "I stuffed it into my backpack. Wanna have a look?" he asked.

"Sure," Dave said excitedly before Hal could say a word.

"Okay." John removed his backpack from his shoulder and placed it on the ground. "You might want to hold your breath a little," he warned as he uncovered his backpack.

"Jesus…what the hell is…" Dave never got the chance to finish his question as a small, black flat-fish like insect thing flew out from John's backpack and attached itself to his face.

Hal started to panic almost at once. The thing which John had found was still alive and it had attached itself to Dave's face and he had no idea what to do and maybe he should get John to help or perhaps he should just rip the thing out but he wouldn't know if that would tear Dave's face off when he did that but it's better than…

"Hal, chill out. It's just looking for a new host," he heard John say in a very faraway manner as the latter picked up his backpack and walk towards him.

"John? What the fuck…what the fuck is that thing? Oh my God…" Hal said as realisation dawned on his face.

"You guessed it, "'John' said before he covered Hal's face with his backpack.

Hal really wanted to scream out loud but his entire face was covered by something that was trying to stick its three tails into his nostrils and his mouth.


	2. Chapter 2

And the spawn of the Old Ones covered the Earth, and Their children endureth throughout the ages.

Abdul Al-hazred, Necronomicon

"_Welcome back, to my humble abode," John said with a flourish as he opened the door to his house. Mim stepped with a slight look of amusement on her face. It was still as she had remembered it: slightly untidy with books left open on the table, empty dishes on the dining table and…piles of newspapers with black circles on them._

"_What's this?" she asked as she reached towards a sheet of paper and picked it up. _Mysterious object found in Middleton sewer_, the headline read and Mim turned to look at John. "Since when were you interested in these?" she asked with a raised eyebrow._

"_Since the World Fair last year," John said, giving her a shrug. He removed his coat and vest and dropped them on a chair. "Do you want your bath now or later?" he asked._

"_Now is wonderful," she replied absently as she continued reading the article. It was written by Monica Rockwaller, her rival when she was working at the Middleton Daily. It seems that she was still covering all the strange and unusual reports…good for her. Mim smiled at the thought of Monica chasing all kinds of lunatics in order to get her story._

_Then she noticed the footnote which John had scribbled at the bottom of the page. _Not the proof I need_, he had scrawled there. Mim frowned in puzzlement. _What proof?_ She thought._

_She picked up another newspaper sheet and looked at it. Again it was about another strange object and another footnote at the end of the article that read, _Not this one either

_She placed down the article and turned to stare towards the kitchen where John was busy stoking up the fire on his stove. A faint smile played at her lips as she realised what he had been doing for her in the past year. _He really is the best friend a person can have_, she thought fondly. If only she could just repay him for the effort that he was putting into this search…_

_John looked up from his task and smiled at her when he noticed that she was watching him. "Don't worry. I'll get this fire up and started and then you can have your bath," he said._

"_Thank you," she said weakly and she sat down on one of John's chair. What could she do for him?_

"This is…paradise," Ron Stoppable said as he gazed in awe at the rows and rows of booth before him.

Kim Possible shook her head in mock despair as she glanced at her best friend. "Explain to me why I am here again," she said.

"Because this is the most bon diggity place in the whole wide world at the moment," Ron flashed Kim a wide grin. In truth, he had begged her to come with him and Felix to the Grand Gaming Gallery or G3 as it was commonly called. He was surprised when she actually said yes. Usually she'd be all, "Ron, I am so not going to game convention" and all that. He was glad, of course, that she had accepted his invitation especially since Felix had to bail out at the last moment because he had some physiotherapy session to attend.

"Hey, Rufus, little buddy, wake up! You're missing out on all the fun stuff!" he patted one his cargo pants' pockets gently. A tiny pink head emerged from the pocket and glanced around furtively.

"G3!" Rufus squeaked in joy and he scrambled up onto Ron's shoulder to get a better view of the area.

Kim gave the two of them a wry look of amusement as they began to explore the huge hall where the convention was being held. "So what is it that people do in this kind of exhibitions anyway?" she asked curiously.

"Check out the new games, watch trailers and movies, watch the hot bodies on display…" Ron rattled off.

"Hot bodies? What hot…" Kim's voice trailed off as she stared open-mouthed at a young man with brown dreadlocks, slim but muscular body and a plastic sword as tall as she was walk by her.

"Not exactly what I had in mind about the hot bodies but that's the idea," Ron said with a large grin as he pushed her mouth back in place.

"Ron. Camera. Now," Kim ordered. He dutifully placed his digi-cam on her waiting hand and she quickly took a quick snap of the young man who had just caught her eye earlier.

"Rufus, another has come over to the G3 side," Ron said solemnly to his pet.

"Uh huh uh huh."

"So not the convert, Ron," Kim retorted as she hung his camera around her neck. "Now, let's do some scouting," she said with a grin and she grabbed his hand as she started off in search of the hunk whose picture she had just taken.

_It felt good to have taken a proper bath again, Mim reflected as she took the towel that John had prepared for her and began drying herself with it. Not like the cold hasty ones which she had had in the past year where she was constantly on the move and couldn't afford the luxury of a decent hot bath._

_There was a knock on the door. "Are you finished?" John called out._

"_Yes!" Mim replied as she continued to rub herself dry. _

"_Okay…I'll just leave some clothes outside and I'll meet you downstairs. Are you feeling hungry?" John asked._

"_Yes please," she replied. She knew that he would understand her reply and sure enough, he answered, "Okay Mim. Do you want some tea to wash it down with?"_

"_Whiskey," she called out._

_There was silence for a moment, before John asked in a slightly surprised voice, "Since when did you started to drink?"_

_Mim smiled sadly to herself as she continued to dry herself. _Since a year ago_, she thought to herself. Aloud, she said, "Does it really matter? I haven't asked you when you started drinking, did I?" _

_She heard chuckle out loud and he replied, "Alright, you win. It's good to have a drinking partner anyway." Then she heard his footsteps fade off as he walked towards the kitchen._

_When his footsteps had died away completely, she wrapped her towel around her body and she headed towards the door. Opening it, she noticed that he had left a pile of neatly folded clothes on the floor, including a dress which she recognised as belonging to John's late mother. She picked up the clothes he had left and closed the door so that she could change her clothes._

_Five minutes later, she walked into John's kitchen, in time to see him put the finishing touches on her favourite turkey and egg sandwich. On the dining table, there was a bottle scotch and of two empty drinking glasses. Mim couldn't decide which one was more tempting, the sandwich or the scotch._

"_No drinking on an empty stomach," John said sternly, taking the decision out of her hand as he handed her the finished sandwich. She smiled at him and bit down on the sandwich._

"_How is it?" John asked, watching her as she chewed thoughtfully on her sandwich._

"_It's good. Now hand me the scotch," she said with a menacing tone in her voice and she made a grab at him with her free hand. He evaded her hand easily and he reached for the bottle and the glasses._

"_Alright, since you asked for it," he said with a grin as he opened up the bottle and began pouring some of its' contents into the two glasses._

"Ron, you never told me G3 was a hunk fest," Kim said with a smile on her face as she watched several male models walk past her. They noticed her gaze upon her and they waved at her, causing her to blush slightly and she waved back at them before she took a picture of them with Ron's digital camera.

"It is? 'Cause I never really noticed it before, KP. Maybe I need to check my oestrogen level just to make sure I'm still interested in men," Ron said with an amused look on his face.

She gave him a punch on his shoulder in reply to his remark. "Ow! That hurt, KP," Ron complained as he rubbed his shoulder.

"Serves you right," she said with a smirk on her lips. "You know, maybe I should…"

Her Kimmunicator beeped its familiar four beeps and she reached into her pocket to take it out. "Hey Wade. What's the sitch?" she asked.

Wade Load looked at her from the Kimmunicator's screen with a slight look of envy on his face. "How's G3, guys?" he asked.

"Never been better! We're having a bon diggity blast!" Ron said with a slight grin as he peered at Wade from behind Kim's shoulder.

Kim caught herself before her head nodded and she said, "Wade, is there anything going on or did you just call to say hi?"

"Right. You've got a hit on your site, Kim. Apparently, three men from Goldenton had gone up into the Gold Mountains range about a week ago and they haven't come back ever since. A search party has already been organised but they hadn't had any luck yet, so their families decided to call you in as their last resort," Wade explained in his business voice.

"Do you have their pictures?" Kim asked.

"Already uploaded them into the Kimmunicator. You'll be needing some equipment when you head to the mountain range so go to your hotel and wait there for an hour or so. I'll drop off some of the things that you'll need," Wade said before he took a sip from his drink.

"Thanks Wade. Alright Ron, we've got a job to do," Kim said to her best friend as she slipped the Kimmunicator into her pocket.

"Got it…although we might want to hurry on the whole rescue thingy since G3's gonna end in about two more days and I'd hate to miss the grand finale," he said as he followed her out of the exhibition hall.

"What grand finale?"

"Oh…no one knows how G3 ends every year. But it always goes out with a bang!" Ron said as mysteriously as he could.

"Uh huh uh huh," Rufus chattered excitedly as he stood on Ron's shoulder and mimed a big explosion with his two forepaws, complete with sound effects.

_After they had two drinks, John's face turned serious as he placed his empty glass on his table and he asked, "Who is it?"_

_Mim raised an eyebrow at him. "What do you mean?"_

"_You said you came here because an acquaintance of ours asked you to him. Who is it?" John asked._

_Mim grinned widely at him. "John, you'll never believe it…not in a hundred years," she declared._

"_Oh…who is it?"_

"_Inspector Barkin."_

_John blinked three times in response to her answer while Mim did her best to stifle her laugh. "You're joking, right?" he asked incredulously._

_She nodded as the memory of his telephone call loomed in her mind. She hadn't quite believed it herself when Barkin called her and immediately suspected that it was merely a simple plan to lure her back to Middleton so that he could arrest her but he had pleaded otherwise and he sounded sincere so she had given him the benefit of the doubt…for now. There was something else she needed though…_

"_John…I need your help," she said firmly._

"_Yes. Where's your suitcase?"_

_This time it was Mim's turn to be surprise. "What?"_

"_Because you are going to pack and you are going to leave Middleton before Barkin finds out that you're here. It's a trap, I tell you!" John said in a panic as he rose up from his seat, his face flushed._

"_John, please…be calm. I think that Barkin is telling the truth about needing my help…" Mim started to say in her most reassuring voice._

"_Oh? This, coming from Inspector Barkin who used to say that you should be locked up in a kitchen and never be allowed to write another article again? I think not! Mim, how could you be so naïve? Do you really think Barkin would not take the chance to arrest you the moment he sees you and lock you up in a prison cell for the rest of your life?" he interrupted her, his voice getting higher with each word that he said._

"_I realised that John. That's why I need to calm down and listen to what I have to tell you," Mim said in an iritable voice. _

_John stopped his ranting and he looked at Mim, as though he thought that whatever brilliant plan she might concocted, it was still stupid of her to walk into a possible trap in the first place. "Go on…I'm listening," he said quietly._

"_Good. John, I want you to come with me when I meet with Barkin tomorrow," she said, causing him to raise an eyebrow._

"_Why?"_

_She explained her plan to him and John listened to it without interrupting once. When she had finished, he reached out for the bottle of scotch and poured himself another drink. "Mim, if it were up to me, I would knock you unconscious right now and put you on the first train to New City…" he said._

"_But it's not up to you, John. So would you please do as I told you to do?" Mim asked._

_John lifted his glass to his lips and took a long sip from his scotch before he placed his glass back onto the table. "No," he said quietly._

_There was an awkward silence at the table. Finally Mim stood up and said, "Well…I'll be going to my room right now."_

"_Mim, I…"_

"_Good night, John," she said curtly as she left the kitchen and went upstairs to her room, leaving him alone with his thoughts and his bottle._

Within the hour, a yellow van stopped in front of the hotel where Kim and Ron were staying in Goldenton. The two of them were already waiting there, dressed in their mission clothes and were in the midst of discussing what to do after receiving their equipment.

A young man stepped out of the van with a huge parcel and walked towards them. "Kim Possible and sidekick?" he asked.

"That's Ron Stoppable," Ron said with a slightly annoyed tone in his voice.

Kim nodded and asked the man "Is that for us?" as she pointed at the parcel.

"Yup," he replied and he handed the parcel over to her. "Now if you would just sign here," he said as he motioned towards a clipboard with an attached piece of paper and pen that was placed on top of the parcel.

Kim took the pen and scanned the paper quickly before she signed it and said, "Thanks for the delivery…" she glanced at the man's nametag, "…Carl."

"Don't worry about it. It's the least FastDelv can do for you after you saved our reputation by delivering that top secret package to the president before he could leave for Iraq last year," he said with a grin.

"Aw, it was no big. Anyone could have gotten through the laser turrets they equipped Air Force One with," Kim said with a light tone in her voice.

"Right…" Cal said cautiously before he got into his van and drove off; leaving the two teens behind to check out the parcel he had left behind. The Kimmunicator beeped again and Kim reached into her pocket to retrieve it.

"Go, Wade," she said while Ron began to rip the parcel's brown paper apart.

"Thought you might want to know what I stuffed into the package I sent you two. There're two survival kits with enough rations for a whole week, your grapple guns, a handheld biometric scanner, two sets of climbing gear and my latest invention, a pair of shock gloves. One punch from this baby could knock out a grizzly bear!" Wade gushed excitedly.

"Sweet! How does it work?" Ron asked as he rummaged through the parcel's contents and pulled out the shock gloves. They looked like gloves which were made from Kevlar except that the knuckle area was padded with a metal strip that was about half an inch in thickness.

"Just put it on and punch away. The shock effect will last about fifty times and then the batteries are dead," the boy genius explained.

"Got it, Wade. Though why did you sent the shock gloves to us? It's not like we're gonna be using it during this mission anyway," Kim said with a slight frown.

Wade grinned at her. "Thought you'd never ask," he said and typed rapidly on his keyboard. The screen on the Kimmunicator changed to show the schematics of the shock gloves. Kim stared at it for a moment and she noticed something. "Is that a…"

"It's a short distance shock discharger that I'm trying to incorporate into the gloves' basic design. I want you to field test that if you get a chance during the mission," Wade said as the Kimmunicator switched back to his image.

"How does it work?" Ron asked.

"You watched the Arachnid-Guy movies? That's how it works," Wade said as he imitated the movie character's actions on screen for Kim and Ron to see.

Kim nodded once. "Got it, Wade. Thanks for the gear and by the way, did you arrange a ride for us?" she asked.

"Already did. A helicopter should be arriving right about…" the sounds of an approaching helicopter could be heard in the distance, drowning off whatever he wanted to say. Kim flashed him a smile of gratitude and he returned it with his own and a thumbs-up sign.

Quickly she and Ron gathered up the gear which Wade had sent them as a rope ladder dropped down from the sky about ten metres away from them. Once the two teens had climbed up the rope ladder and boarded the helicopter, it began to head off in the direction of the Golden Mountain range, where they had three lost men to rescue.

Hal tried to open his eyes but all he could see what darkness. _Am I dead?_ he thought but the fresh searing pain that lanced through his right arm told him otherwise. He could test something in his mouth but he couldn't quite place the taste; it eluded him and for some strange reason, it annoyed him.

Somewhere, in the dark distance, he could hear a strange chant. It was a disturbing chant, even though he couldn't quite make out what it was, though it was getting louder as the seconds ticked by.

It took a while to realise why the chant was so disturbing to him: he could hear John's and Dave's voices amongst the chant and they were chanting as if they had done it for most of their entire lives.


End file.
